The
fall season officially began Monday night with the four major networks
all airing new episodes, including the premieres of three new shows and
the return of big hits like The Voice and Castle. And NBC emerged victorious.

The Voice season 4 kicked off with 15 million viewers, up more than 2.5 million from last fall's premiere and beating Dancing with the Stars. The huge start also helped the new drama The Blacklist at 10pm with 12.6 million viewers, which is a million more than the premiere of Revolution had in the same time slot a year ago.The Blacklist Premiere Recap>>The Voice season 5 Premiere Recap>>

The Blacklist is now the highest-rated new drama of the season as the new shows on CBS didn't do so well. New sitcom Mom premiered with 8 million viewers while the 10pm drama Hostages had just 7.4 million viewers. That makes it the lowest-rated CBS drama premiere since the mid-season bomb CHAOS in April 2011.

However, the news for CBS wasn't all bad since the one-hour premiere of the final season of How I Met Your Mother was actually up from its premiere last season to 9.4 million.

ABC definitely took a hit with the second episode of Dancing with the Stars season 17, down about 2.5 million viewers to 13.6 million. That was still high enough to give a boost to the sixth season premiere of Castle, which hit 11.5 million, up a million from last year.

Finally, FOX's Sleepy Hollow took a dip in its second week, as most new shows do, down 1.5 million viewers to a still-solid 8.6 million viewers. Based on last week's trend, the show should get a huge bump thanks to DVR viewing.